What are the Sexual Orientations of the Sailor Senshi

 

So this is a blog idea I've had a lot of years but I wanna answer if people are curious what is the Sexual Orientation of the Sailor Senshi, to the best of my discernment. When talking about fiction you can talk about Canon (what is confirmed the case) and Headcanon (what the case is in your mind), I'm going to be talking about something in the middle of those two, that is to say I am going to be talking about what I think is most likely the case. Some of the things I say aren't like necessarily 100% confirmed but everything here I do think is more probable then most and I will give my rationale why. This is going to be based on the Manga since it's the version I know best, the most consistent, and also the original canon.

Another thing to note is that Sailor Moon was written and set in 1990s Japan. This cuts both ways: girls calling each other "pretty" is not itself evidence they're attracted to other girls. It's culturally fairly common for girls to call each other pretty, especially in that cultural context. On the other hand, a girl saying she's not interested in a relationship may not preclude her being attracted to girls as in the context of 1990s Japan "a relationship" for a girl would have been assumed to be "a relationship with a guy."

Some other notes: it happens a few times in Sailor Moon that a girl will show attraction to another girl who is convincingly disguised as a guy. For me unless this attraction persists after the other girl's gender is revealed I am skeptical of using this as evidence of sapphism as I view attraction as being based on perceived gender rather then actual gender. Finally I'm going to be trying to ignore evidence that's not "in the story per se." Naoko is a bit of a provocateur and has drawn numerous images of the Senshi in very intimate posing however I only count those if they happened in the story as opposed to an image produced outside it. 

Going into each Senshi

Usagi Tsukino:

So Usagi very clearly like guys. Her love is Mamoru Chiba whom she marries and has a child with. She also shows attraction to Motoki as well as to Haruka and Seiya when they are convincingly disguised as guys. 

Does she like girls? I'm just going to be honest, yes. I get that the fandom has been a touch divided about discussing the Senshi's orientations with some people wanting them to all have their own unique headcanon-ed orientation, and some insisting they're all straight except Haruka and Michiru, but looking at the evidence fairly dispassionately, even if it's not explicitly stated, Usagi clearly likes girls.

In chapter 3 Usagi sees Rei for the first time, gets comical heart eyes and follows her off the bus because she's so pretty. I recognize there is some cultural leeway here and that's why I don't count for instance Usagi blushing lightly and calling Ami cute in Act 2, but this is far more exaggerated and were this scene about a male character no one would have any arguments about the scene. Similarly Usagi seems to retain attraction to both Haruka and Seiya after their gender is revealed. 

Most Likely Orientation: Bisexual: It really seems like Usagi is intended to be read by the viewer as Bisexual, having attraction to both men and women. 

Ami Mizuno:

The Four Guardian Senshi in the Manga include two that are boy-crazy and two that are not. Ami is not, but this is not because she is not attracted to boys, but because she is a responsible student focused on her studies. She shows attraction to Motoki and in Ami's first love, becomes incredibly flustered at the idea of getting love letters from boys, as well as has an "ideal" type of guy (which for her is like Albert Einstein cause she's a nerd.) The art at the start of the story shows her reading Yaoi which ties into the 90s archetype of the nerd as the covert pervert. 

Whether she likes girls is a bit harder to say. The plot of Ami's First Love involves her competing academically with someone she's never met going by the name "Mercurius" who she clearly develops feelings for under the pretense of their intelligence. It is perhaps telling that she falls for this person without even seeing them or their gender, suggesting that intelligence is the primary factor for what she finds attractive, connecting to her "ideal type of guy." It's interesting that while Ami is still acting all blushy and lovey over her rival and is making a denial about having feelings for them she says "He (or She) is my greatest rival! Love is unthinkable" as if suggesting that Love WOULD be thinkable for him OR HER if Mercurius was not her greatest rival...

Most Likely Orientation: Sapiosexual: Normally I wouldn't suggest something so specific for some like this where I'm trying to find the most probable however once again it really does feel like we are supposed to read Ami's attraction as being attraction to intelligence specifically, with the possibility that this includes women as well. The only real evidence this is her lack of attraction to Taiki in the manga under identical circumstances of seeing Taiki as a rival, though at the time Taiki was disguised as a guy so it doesn't really tell us anything. Also she may just not be into foreheads if you know what I mean. 

Rei Hino:

Rei is the other of the Guardian Senshi who is not boy-crazy, though unlike Ami this is not due to studiousness but due to other factors. Rei starts the series with a clear misandristic streak derived from her bad relationship with her father. Her Dream Chapter also heavily contains themes of her wondering why other girls are so interesting in getting boyfriends and relationships. If any of the Inner Senshi don't like boys, I would presume it would be Rei. It's not as clearcut as I'd like it, there's a line in Casablanca Memories that can be ambiguously interpreted as her feeling betrayed by Kaido, her father's assistant for thinking they were kindred souls or that she had feelings for him. She also at least briefly considers Minako's comically terrible advice to marry a man so she can use him as a servant around the Shrine. Considering this is set in the 1990s in Japan, I think it's more consistent to say she is not androphilic and is acting based on social pressures of the time. Also I guess I should mention that Parallel Sailor Moon exists where the Guardian Senshi are all married to men and have daughters that look just like them and Usagi has a second child and blah blah but this is an alternate timeline and I don't really use it for any information about the main Sailor Moon timeline. Some people do use it as a kind of secondary evidence but I personally consider it outside information.

Whether she likes women is also kind of interesting. In the Stars Arc there is a famous scene where she and Minako defiantly tell the Starlights they don't need men and is framed like they are in a relationship. I don't like using this framing evidence because in universe that's not what they are trying to say but it is a secondary form of evidence. In the Dream Arc there is some lines that are suggestive of Rei not just not wanting a boyfriend but not wanting a relationship in general, wanting to remain independent and you can interpret that as evidence she doesn't want any kind of romantic relationship. It's complicated by the fact that this is 1990s Japan and "a relationship" would usually mean "a relationship with the opposite sex." The only other thing I can think might be of note is that in Rei and Minako's Exam Battles Chapter, Rei is possessed by a ghost who attempts to kiss the other girls at Rei's school and Minako is shocked and thinks Rei must be possessed immediately. This really doesn't mean anything to me because Rei kissing girls is clearly not what Minako is responding to here primarily but that the possessed Rei seems to be forcing herself onto other girls. 

Most Likely Orientation: Asexual: This one is complex but if I had to say, it seems like if a girl like Rei existed in the 1990s who displays some tendencies towards Asexuality and some towards Allosexuality (Non-Asexuality) my assumption would be either that she would be somewhere between the two (Greysexuality) or that she is Asexual but is acting based on the social pressures of the time, which seems the most likely to me based on how her attractions seem transient and nebulous. 

Makoto Kino:

Makoto is one of the two boy-crazy Inner Senshi, and in particular she is shows a romantic traditionalist mindset when it comes to romance. We see her romantic fantasy in her short story and it is clearly as much of a traditional romantic fantasy as one can get, with her being a domestic woman, baking her tall male love food when he comes home dressed in a suit bringing her flowers. She demonstrates a level of attraction to Motoki and Asanuma. She shows attraction towards both Haruka and the Starlights when they are disguised as men. 

She doesn't really seem to find women attractive. She doesn't show attraction to Haruka after her gender is known. We don't see her reaction to the Three Lights' gender as she dies during that fight and is resurrected in the Last Chapter. 

Most Likely Orientation: Heterosexual: In contrast to Rei, this one is pretty simple. Mako-chan is probably straight. Her sexuality is clearly the most traditionalist of the Senshi and she never displays any kind of sapphic tendencies. 

Minako Aino:

I don't think I need to tell you that Minako likes boys. Minako is the other of the Boy-Crazy Inners along with Makoto but where Makoto is traditionalist and sweetly sentimental, Minako is just downbad. Codename Sailor V takes place over roughly the course of a year at most, and she has "1,000 First Loves" in that time period, all the ones we see are boys. She shows attraction to most of the attractive boys in the series and is the most racy and flirtatious of the Senshi. 

In terms of whether Minako likes women there's a lot of points to go over both for and against . Some people take how often Minako shows attraction to men and think that means she's not attracted to women since you'd think one of her love interests would be a woman by chance, but I don't agree with this logic. Bisexuals don't have to be attracted to both sexes equally, it's perfectly possible to be a bisexual woman who is mostly attracted to men but occasionally get girl crushes. There's obviously the framing in that scene in the Stars Arc with Rei I mentioned prior but once again that's not really "in" the story per se. There's also art by Naoko showing Minako in very intimate pose with Usagi but that's also not really in the story. There's a scene in Rei and Minako's Exam Battles where a possessed Rei tries to kiss Minako and Minako yells in horror but this is clearly not because a girl is trying to kiss her but because a possessed Rei is trying to forcibly kiss her. There's a very interesting scene in Codename Sailor V which you can take either way. In one chapter Minako is an assistant to a Manga Writer who ends up getting married to her very attractive male editor. Minako sees this and declares in Minako like fashion she's gonna become a manga writer so she can marry her attractive assistant. She asks "My Future Editor, My Destined Partner, where are you now?" and Artemis drying asks "and if that partner is a woman?" Causing Minako to attack him for ruining her fantasy. You can pretty obviously take this as her not being attracted to women though you could maybe argue that if partner here refers to editor that she's just mad Artemis ruined her fantasy. On the other hand there's an interesting interpretation I read. Because Artemis is the only one at the moment with memory of the Silver Millennium and their past lives this could be a connection to the sapphic scene in Stars where Rei and Minako reminiscence on their pledging their loyalty to Serenity and saying they don't need men. As Artemis has memory of the past he may recall more about Minako then she herself knows. An interesting idea though I do think it's a bit of a stretch. Finally, Minako seems to still be Attracted to the Three Lights in Act 53 and this is after she saw them transform into the Sailor Starlights meaning she knows they are women though you can maybe argue that it's normal Idol Adoration. 

Most Likely Orientation: Bisexual: This is probably the one I think has the best argument as there's a lot of information you can use in both directions but for me the last piece of information is the most notable, that she was aware the Three Lights are women yet still seemed to be attracted to them. 

Usagi "Chibiusa" Small Lady Serenity:

Chibiusa shows attraction to and has a romance with Helios, showing that she is interested in boys. She also has her friendship with Hotaru. It's commonly observed that every adaptation of Sailor Moon makes their relationship seem more and more like crushes which is amazing it started with the manga which already seemed like a relationship. I guess technically you could say their relationship in the Manga is just friendship though it is multiple times framed as a relationship with Hotaru outright comparing her relationship to Chibiusa with Usagi and Mamoru's for instance. 

Most Likely Orientation: Bisexual: So I think Chibiusa likes both for another reason. If you grant that Usagi is Bisexual, it seems to be the case that Lunarian Women in Sailor Moon are very like their mothers. Princess Serenity was said to be the spitting image of Queen Serenity and it's a major thematic point that Chibiusa is a lot like Usagi, sharing names, birthdays, hairstyles, personality traits, because Chibiusa's story is about stepping out of her mom's shadow. Because being LGBT seems to be partially hereditary I think it would make a lot of sense if it was inherited. 

Hotaru Tomoe:

Everything said about Chibiusa and Hotaru's relationship applies here, they have a friendship which is framed as paralleling a romantic relationship at a couple of points so take that as however much evidence you apply to it. However it is impossible to make any kind of argument if Manga Hotaru likes boys or not. This is because Hotaru does not exchange one line of dialogue with a male character in the entire series outside of her biological father. The only relevant bit of information I can think of is that Hotaru did not seem jealous when Chibiusa was with Helios but she DID seem jealous when Chibiusa was with Naruru and Ruruna. That said, I don't even really know what to make of that and how it would apply to her orientation. This is probably the most impossible to say not because the information is contradictory like Minako's but because there's so little information to go off. 

Most Likely Orientation: Bisexual?: The one I am least confident on, if you do think she has feelings for Chibiusa then it's a question of bi vs lesbian and the former seems to be more common statistically going by current research with the latest Japanese polls having people who identify as gay being around 0.5-1% and people identifying as bi to be 2-5% so it's a bit more likely but that's all I have to go on. 

Haruka Tenoh:

Haruka is a Lesbian. I know I'm jumping to conclusions but I think that's pretty obvious to anyone. Haruka dresses in a way that is very Queer, though differently Queer from the anime (in the manga Haruka switches from feminine to very masculine presentation whereas in the anime she is consistently mid level masculine presentation.) She is flirtatious with Usagi but is never so with guys. I know I said in Minako's section that some bisexuals simply have a very strong preference and it's not explicitly stated she doesn't like men like it is in the anime, but the combination of her very heavily queer expression even in a time and place where such was unusual, her flirtatious attitude towards another girl, her mildly defensive actions when Michiru is approached by a man, etc. makes this the one I would be most confident on. 

Most Likely Orientation: Lesbian: I feel fairly good on this one. 

Michiru Kaioh:

So Michiru's orientation seems to be the most discussed orientation of all the Senshi. She and Haruka are girlfriends so it is clear she has sapphic attraction. However whether she is bi or not causes controversy. I have to be totally honest when the topic comes up I see two sides that seem irrationally devoted to both directions for poor reasons. One side seems very dedicated to the notion that Michiru is a Lesbian from an emotional reaction that if she is not that would somehow make Haruka and Michiru's relationship less of a lesbian relationship. Similarly the other side is invested in the notion that Michiru is bi seemingly based just on the stereotype that femme sapphics are more likely to be heteronormative and attracted to men which is similarly irrational. 

We do actually have a short scene where a man expresses interest in Michiru. A male fan approaches Michiru and begins asking several questions and before Michiru responds Haruka shows up and practically breaks his hand (politely) before the two leave. It's difficult to gleam much from the scene considering how short it is. There is outside evidence that is better though it's outside the story so take it for what you will. It is said at an interview in San Diego back in 1998 when there was confusion about Haruka and Michiru's relationship in the English Speaking Fandom a female fan asked "Are Uranus and Neptune really lovers and if so why did you make them gay?" Naoko commented that they are indeed a couple because Haruka has the heart of a man and Michiru is more girlish which some people seem to take as indirect evidence because Naoko didn't correct her about "making them gay." Probably a better piece of information that is still outside evidence is that in the Materials Collection there is the statement that Michiru is a woman without need of a man, which... is a way of putting it Naoko 😄

Most Likely Orientation: Lesbian: I don't really like using information from outside the story but there's nothing in the story that's very conclusive either way and the secondary information all seems to point in one direction. 

Setsuna Meioh:

Setsuna is strongly implied to have feelings for King Endymion in the original story and is outright confirmed to in secondary material so that part's fairly straightforward. There's not much evidence on whether or not she has any attraction to women. There's some framing technically in that she raises Hotaru with Haruka and Michiru who refers to them as Haruka-papa, Michiru-mama, and Setsuna-mama. That said I don't really think this is very strong evidence that she is sapphic. There's not really much else to go on though.

Most Likely Orientation: Heterosexual: Honestly I don't like this one. If I was going just off vibes I wouldn't say it, but I don't think there's any particular reason to think Setsuna in the manga has any sapphic attraction and statistically it's less likley

Bonus Round:

Mamoru Chiba:

It is clear that Mamoru likes women given his love is Usagi, they get married, have a child together, etc. We also don't see him interact with other men enough to get any suggestion on whether he is straight or bisexual. The only reason I bring him is up, there's an interesting thing to note where it's implied he is very popular at his school, with both genders, yet he seems to be a loner and who was searching for Usagi. Now in universe it is possible this is just because he was getting dreams of the Princess calling for him and so wasn't interested. Another possibility is that he may be Demisexual or similarly on the Greysexual spectrum. Demisexuals are those who only develop sexual attraction to someone after developing a strong emotional bond with them. Given that Mamoru is designed to be somewhat of Naoko's perfect man: attractive, intelligent, capable, etc. but doesn't seem to have much prior romantic experience, it's possible that he may be somewhat on the Greysexual spectrum. Of course it's also possible he just wasn't interested or he was focused on the Silver Crystal to regain his memories. This one is definitely a lot more speculative, it's just a thought I had that I wanted to bring up as it was relevant to the blog and didn't know where else to put it. 

I do wanna say that none of this is my headcanon per se, this is my attempt to say "okay if the story of this Manga really existed in the time and place it was said to, what would you guess the character's sexual orientations would be."

If you want to know my actual headcanon, I have a very cosmic mystical view of the Senshi. It is said on a few instances in the Manga that the Senshi are the Incarnations or Avatars of the Gods. They die and reincarnate before reawakening to their true identity as a Sailor Senshi regaining the memories of their Past Lives. Galaxia comments they have two Star Seeds, a human star seed representing their human lifetime, and an eternal Sailor Crystal, representing their immortal Sailor Senshi lifetime. My personal headcanon is that the Sailor Senshi identity, like that Saturn Spirit Hotaru talks to in the Dream Arc are all bisexual and this is because they're mystical immortal entities similar to the Greek Mythological Gods. The Greek Gods were often presented bisexually because, to my understanding they represented abstract cosmic forces that acted on people male and female alike. Now I think that their Human Identities might have a different orientation which is a way their Eternal Identity comes to understand the universe in the same way they might have different personalities or experiences or relationships with each other. 

I'm a bisexual myself and so it's possible that it's sort of me projecting my view of the world onto the series, but I personally see most Senshi who are Awoken as Bi in a sense, with memories from many lifetimes where they have experienced love of all kinds and they essentially take on a Human Identity (or Alien Identity if they're born elsewhere in the universe) that is a full personality with a full and real orientation but is only a temporary guise for the Eternal Identity. It's the same way that Minako at the end of Sailor V says that the Minako she was until this was point was only a disguise after awakening to her Past Life. To me it sorta goes beyond orientation, that's how I view the Senshi in a more broad general sense, which is that they are Eternal Identities manifesting Temporal Ones across time to come to know each other and the world better.